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“…let’s not stop there. Let’s put a bill in front of Pence that will protect the right of people to discriminate against other people who were born “different” – red heads are in the minority – let’s put them on the list; and left-handers – they are way scary; and really tall people because they consume too much of our earth’s resources; and people with freckles – those freckled folks should all be discriminated against, for sure.”

Just when you think the world can’t possibly get any crazier, some new insanity pushes itself through the crowd to claim the Grand Prize. So… did you hear the one about Gov Pence of Indiana signing into law a bill that protects the right of bigots to practice their bigotry? Yeah. It is now legal in the state of Indiana for businesses to reject gay customers. If a bigoted restaurant owner, hotel owner, or grocer, or barber, baker, or candle-stick maker doesn’t want to serve homosexuals, he can now refuse to provide them with goods and services. I mean… heaven forbid that we should discriminate against people who want to discriminate against people for… well… having been born different. Because that would just be wrong… right?

And I’m thinking – let’s not stop there. Let’s put a bill in front of Pence that will protect the right of people to discriminate…

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Scott and Karen on their wedding day, March 31, 1984 (photo by Bob Harbison)

Happiness is spiritual,born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it. – from the chapter titled “Marriage” in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy

I believe that every citizen – regardless of race, ethnicity, social and economic status, religion, non-religion, gender, or sexual orientation – should have the exact same rights as every other citizen – including the right for consenting adults to marry whom they love.

This week my husband and I will celebrate our 31st anniversary. Every year about this time I find myself thinking back to that happy day and the days leading up to it.

You know those shows you see on television where the bride spends HUGE amounts of time, thought, and bucks choosing just the right ring, dress, caterer, flowers, music, photographer, and reception venue for her “big day” – those shows where every minute detail of the wedding production is analyzed, critiqued, and judged for its merits on visual perfection? Where the ceremony is somber and refined and the highlight of the whole shebang is the dress the bride wears?

Yeah. That wasn’t us.

My engagement ring was a little garnet ring I picked out from a small jewelry shop in Pike Place Market in Seattle, and the man who sold it to us was cheerfully, flamboyantly, hilariously gay – he had us cracking up the minute we walked into his shop. My wedding dress was the first dress I tried on from the sales rack at our local Bon Marche. Cost me $120. Our minister was a hoot – we’d met with him for a required counseling session, and when he told us that anything he had to say to us would be pretty much useless at this point – because it’s really only AFTER the wedding that the bride and groom realize what they’ve gotten themselves into (we later learned that he’d just recently been divorced), we immediately recognized the man had a sense of humor, and he was, for sure, the minister we wanted officiating our nuptials. The wedding was a joyful, light-hearted affair in a small Methodist church in Gig Harbor – I remember the minister asking us if we really wanted to hold the service in his church – it was very small – could maybe hold 100 people – and very old (it’s since been torn down and a larger church built in a different location) – but, for our purposes, that little church was perfect – I liked the cozy smallness of it and the stained glass windows – and from the church’s steps we could look out across the water and see Mount Rainier rising above the hills in the distance. The wedding itself was simple, joyful, and natural. We weren’t too concerned with “perfection” – we just wanted our guests to feel comfortable and loved. The reception was held in my parents’ backyard – with the sound of laughter, and the smell of daffodils and plum blossoms, filling the air. And we played volleyball in the pasture – the groom’s team won, but it was a close game. The minister came to the reception, and fit right in with our hooligan families and friends. Before he left he told us that sometimes he’s really worried about the future of the newlyweds he marries – they often seem more concerned about the wedding than the actual marriage – but, after watching us yukking it up with our families and friends, he felt good about being a part of our ceremony. He knew we were going to be alright. We knew how to laugh.

When I think about that day, I can’t imagine why anyone would want to deny other people the right to a wedding, and to a life-long commitment in marriage with the partner they love. I can’t understand why any heterosexual couple would feel their own marriage is threatened by giving homosexuals the same rights that they have. I feel a real yearning for other folks who love one another, and are brave enough to make a commitment to each other, to be allowed to have what my husband and I were allowed to have.

***

“Matrimony should never be entered into without a full recognition of its enduring obligations on both sides. There should be the most tender solicitude for each other’s happiness, and mutual attention and approbation should wait on all the years of married life… Kindred tastes, motives, and aspirations are necessary to the formation of a happy and permanent companionship… Marriage should improve the human species, becoming… a centre for the affections. This, however, in a majority of cases, is not its present tendency, and why? Because the education of the higher nature is neglected, and other considerations, – passion, frivolous amusements, personal adornment, display, and pride, – occupy thought… The scientific morale of marriage is spiritual unity… Marriage should signify a union of hearts… Behold the world’s lack of Christianity and the powerlessness of vows to make home happy, the human mind will at length demand a higher affection. There will ensue a fermentation over this as over many other reforms, until we get at last the clear straining of truth… Matrimony, which was once a fixed fact among us, must lose its present slippery footing, and man must find permanence and peace in a more spiritual adherence.” – excerpts from the chapter titled “Marriage” in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy

The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. – Robert Ingersoll, The Great Agnostic

Ocean is more ancient than the mountains, and freighted with the memories and dreams of Time. – H.P. Lovecraft

I think it would be interesting if old people got anti-Alzheimer’s disease where they slowly began to recover other peoples’ memories. – George Carlin

My husband and I just returned from our most recent trip to Lincoln City, Oregon. We’ve been going there since 1984 – when we discovered the magic of Lincoln City on our honeymoon. We were trying to figure out how many times we’ve been there in the last 29 years, and we figured we’ve made a pilgrimage to Lincoln City probably 27 times – every year, with one or two exceptions.

You know how photographers do time lapse photography to show Nature unfolding in quick time? Yeah, I’m thinking if we took the days my family has spent in Lincoln City and sort of condensed them into a time lapse photography kind of deal, we’d see something like this…

honeymoon, 1984

Meeting the Ocean, 1992

circa 1995

circa 1999

circa 2008

circa 2008

2010

2013

2013

Lincoln City, OR

Lincoln City, OR

Lincoln City, OR

Lincoln City, OR

There we are in 1984 – young, confident, and hopeful – starting our life together – unaware of the challenges ahead, and unaware of the blessings, either – running on the beach – limbs strong and quick and joints well-oiled. My aunt Junie showed me the art of agate-hunting when I was a youngster, and now I’m teaching my new husband how to pick up the glow of an agate on the beach – how to discern the difference between a bona fide agate and a rough piece of quartz…

1992: Introducing our firstborn to the ocean for the first time. His baby body rests on my knee, facing out to the sea. His eyes have locked onto the ocean and taken note of it – he’s chewing his lower lip, eyes moving back and forth along the sea’s horizon, taking in the sights and sounds and smells. It’s becoming a part of him.

1994: We have come to Lincoln City as parents of childREN. We are old hands at parenthood now. Today it is our youngest son’s turn to meet the ocean. We take off his booties and lower his toes into the water. It is a sort of ritual baptism of baby feet – a bonding with the Pacific.

1999: The sons are playing with the surf – letting the waves chase them up the beach. The ocean is their comfortable old friend now.

Jump to April, 2008: I am in crisis. Struggling with severe depression. I am desperate to escape from myself and my constantly-churning thoughts. Oldest son knows I need to get away and asks me if I’d like him to go to Lincoln City with me for Spring Break. How many 16 year-old sons do you know who’d be willing to accompany their moms on a 14-hour (round trip) road trip? I am blest beyond words. On the way to Lincoln City we stop and visit my Aunt Junie, who shares our kinship with the ocean and lives in Depoe Bay, an hour north of Lincoln City. I confide my struggles to Junie, and the feelings of guilt and unworthiness that seem to be a symptom of my illness. Junie is appalled at my feelings of worthlessness. “All her instincts” tell her that I am a good person, she says. “There are no unrightable wrongs, no unforgiveable sins, no fatal mistakes, no fatal diseases, only the eternal now.” She is like Yoda.

July, 2008: Still struggling with the depression. Lincoln City is my respite. I sit on the balcony in the sun and look down on the beach and watch the sons running and cavorting on the sand below. There have been times lately when I’ve wished myself not born. But, watching my sons, it hits me that if I hadn’t been born, they wouldn’t have been born, either. They give me purpose. And the ocean gives me comfort. We stop in Tilamook on the way home and I am drawn to a garden plaque that quotes The Great Agnostic, Robert Ingersoll: “The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here.” On impulse, I buy it. It will sit in a place of honor on our mantel when we return home.

2009: The family meets on the Oregon coast to celebrate Aunt Junie’s life, and spread her ashes on the ocean. We will not get as far as Lincoln City this time, but the ocean that she is now a part of will touch the beaches that have provided such solace to me over the years. And every time I’m near the ocean, I’ll think of Junie – her humor and wisdom and kindness to me.

2010: Hoping, but not with high expectations, I ask my youngest son, who’s just turned 16, if he’d like to make the same road trip that I made with his older brother two years ago. To my surprise and delight, he says he would! We spend two days at the ocean – flying a kite, looking for agates, running (well, okay, he’s doing most of the running now) along the beach. Before we leave on our trip I ask Xander if he’s remembered his swimsuit, long pants, shorts, sweatshirt, sneakers, toothbrush, and sandals. He assures me he has. When we arrive at Lincoln City, I realize that I am the one who’s left her clothes, laptop, and toothbrush back home. It is all very humbling. But there’s a certain freedom in the forgetting, too. I’m scraped down to the bare essentials. Having no laptop is a good thing. I have become big into photography in the last couple years, and I have, at least, remembered my camera. Camera, son, ocean, and the clothes on my back – what else does a person really need? :)

2013: The sons are all grown-up now. They have jobs and things to do. For the first time since we became parents, we will be making our Lincoln City pilgrimage alone. We eat at our favorite eatery there – The Lighthouse Brew Pub – take long walks together, hunt for agates, and remember together who we were when we first found Lincoln City. Young, strong, confident, hopeful. Our lives stretched out ahead of us. And we think about all that’s happened in the 29 years since. And it’s all been good. All of it. Even the bad stuff has been good, really. Just like those blossoms unfolding in time lapse photography – our life together has unfolded most wonderfully.

If you wanted to convince me that I should see the world in the same way you do, how would you go about doing that? Would you threaten me with hell? Try to out-shout me? Pummel me with your (carefully-chosen) *facts*? Do you think that showing hatred and bigotry towards people who don’t belong to your “team” might persuade me to view the world in the same way you do? Do you think you might so impress and humble me with your keen intelligence that I will want to be just like you?

Intelligence is an awesome tool and I respect people who use their intelligence to find ways to help make the world a safer, kinder, healthier place. Eloquence and wit and humor are all qualities I value highly – and I have great respect for people who use eloquence, wit, and humor to disarm and diffuse haters – on the other hand, I have little respect for those who use their wit to bully others and feed their own egos.

No, if your way of looking at the world doesn’t include love and kindness and generosity, it has – in my opinion – nothing of value to offer me. Facts are cool – I love learning new stuff – but if all you have to offer me are a bunch of facts – well, the internet is full of “facts” and accessible to all of us – I don’t need to convert to your way of viewing the world to get facts. You do not have a monopoly on facts.

Honestly, what attracts me to different perspectives is the kindness I feel from the people with those perspectives – the love I feel coming from them. That is something I recognize as useful to me. If you wanted me to convert to your view of the world – whatever that is – the best way to do that would be to show me the love and good will that come from your way of seeing things.

Of course, the people I MOST enjoy conversing with are those people who don’t have any interest in converting me, or showing off to their buddies, or feeding their egos – the people I most enjoy are the ones I can share with – the people who know how to shut up and listen every now and then, and have the courage to share their own views and insights without thinking their way of looking at the world is the ONLY way of looking at the world.

“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.”
– Roald Dahl

“Of course there must be lots of Magic in the world,” he said wisely one day, “but people don’t know what it is like or how to make it. Perhaps the beginning is just to say nice things are going to happen until you make them happen.”
– Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden